Centro de Documentación Musical de
Andalucía Almaviva DS-0146(notes in Spanish, English and
French included, TT=66:48)

Mention El Maestro Alonso in Madrid today and most people will
think you’re talking F1, but there are still a happy band of pilgrims for
whom no walk along Calle Alcalá is complete without a greeting to the
bust of the true and original “Maestro Alonso”, famous composer of
La Calesera and Las Leandras, and next to Federico Chueca the
capital’s most beloved musician. Yet Alonso was a born and bred
Granadine, which makes this tribute from the Andalusian musical establishment a
fitting one.

Fitting in other ways too. In its time Francisco Alonso’s
music was hugely popular and regularly served up fresh on record; yet with the
exception of the evergreen Las Leandras his zarzuelas are now rarely
seen in the theatre, and there hasn’t been a new, complete recording of
any of them for nearly 20 years. Unlike Sorozábal, still a vivid
contemporary presence, Alonso’s work has mistakenly become associated
with the “old” Spain, a world of brutal Francoist nostalgia as
portrayed in Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s modish novel The Shadow of
the Wind, and swashbuckling historical canvasses such as La
calesera or La picarona seem as distant and creaky as an Errol
Flynn film.

If this collection proves one thing, it’s that the music
itself is anything but creaky. Most of what’s here will be unfamiliar
even to many fans, but all of it hits the mark. A good tune is a good tune, and
Alonso’s are very good indeed. His knack was to write directly without
condescension, and with scarcely a wasted note. The orchestrations add zest,
the harmonies Puccinian lushness, but it’s the intense appeal of the
melodies which makes the music live. If anything seems passé it’s
those occasional Andalusian flamenco roulades and curlicues, which maybe the
excellent Juan de Udaeta and his Málaga orchestra felt they had
to represent. Personally I loved it all.

In a balanced mix from the historical zarzuelas grandes,
contemporary sainetes and 1930s revue songs, the Pasodoble
and Cancion de la reja (replete with gypsy-style
ayeos) extracted from the soundtrack of Eusebio Fernández
Ardavín’s 1943 film Forja de almas are of
special rarity. More substantial are the four numbers from Curro
el de Lora, a two act zarzuela produced immediately before the blockbuster
success of La calesera in 1925, and forgotten since. Alonso always
considered it one of finest scores, and on this evidence it’s certainly
one of his most operatic. The extended dúo in particular whets
the appetite for the complete recording due to be made next month in Madrid (
c.f.
zarzuela.net interview with José Julián Frontal )
with the same conductor and orchestra.

The two singers here have the personality to put the material over
convincingly enough – Teresa Novoa especially so in the intensely
catchy cuplé from the revue ¡24 horas
mintiendo!, despite some vocal clouds in her middle register – and
altogether these well-prepared performances are a welcome ornament to the
Alonso catalogue. Outstanding illustrated notes by Emilio Casares
Rodicio, but no texts in Almaviva's tastefully bland presentation.